


What to do when you picked up the pieces?

by LittleMissSweetgrass



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Cleaning, Emotional Hurt, First Aid mentioned, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Ratchet mentioned, Suicide Attempt, vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 04:34:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17015832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleMissSweetgrass/pseuds/LittleMissSweetgrass
Summary: After a late night visitor, Tailgate is left going through the motions of picking up the pieces.This is a Vent Fic





	What to do when you picked up the pieces?

**Author's Note:**

> This work is not beta'd and never will be, It's just something I needed to write to sort through my feelings and experience so i can go to sleep

There was a bannging on the habsuite door loud enough to snap Tailgate from his recharge. He sat up, confused and still dazed looking around the darkened room. In the berth across the room, Cyclonus merely rolled over, ignoring the pounding and trying to go back to sleep. Tailgate looked back at the door wearily and flinched when the banging sounded again. 

Cyclonus growled, and the mini hopped down from his berth to answer the door, before Cyclonus did and made whoever was on the other side regret waking him up.

The knocking happened again, more frenzied this time and Tailgate called out as he rushed to the door.

“I’m coming, I’m coming!”

The mini reached up to hit the command panel, putting on his best grumpy face to let the visitor know how upset he was. It was the middle of the night! He had to be up in a few hours to clean the bottom levels! 

The door swooshed open and all reprimands fizzled out in Tailgate’s vocalizer.

There, wobbling on his twig-like pedes, stood Whirl. His single optic was glazed, as if he wasn’t seeing the minibot in front of him. The glass of the optic itself was shattered, jagged along the rim, as if someone rammed their fist directly through the centre.

HIs cockpit glass was broken too, and he shards from it were embedded in the more delicate wiring of his arms.

Oh, sweet Primus, his arms. It looked like someone had ripped off his claws, so there was nothing but leaking energon, sparking wires, his energon stained rotary blades.

All up and down his legs were slash marks, pink energon bubbling up and dripping down into the transformation seams. Since the thighs were at his optic level, he could see how some of the energon had dried and were staining the plating and crusting in the knee joints.

Whirl faltered again, and that tiny movement snapped Tailgate back into the present. The mini’s mind swam in panic, what should he do? Why is Whirl here, why isn’t he at the medbay? Oh, Primus what happened? Did he get into a fight, did he do this himself?

Tailgate snapped back into focus and sound himself blabbering about comforting nothings, pressing his berth coverings onto the cuts on his legs, and using his polishing cloth he must have grabbed from the his shelf and wrapping the aerial’s arm stumps into it, hoping to cut off the flow of energon.

Cyclonus was up, talking to someone on a comm. link, a clawed hand pressing firmly , grounding, on Whirl’s shoulder as he answered questions. Whirl just sat on Tailgate’s berth, quite, listless, head turned down to stare at his lap.

Not knowing what to do, Tailgate reached up for the hand Cyclonus had on Whirl’s shoulder and moved it so he was holding and putting pressure on the arm stumps. He caught on and moved to press his other had on Whirl’s one thigh, the call having ended. 

Tailgate, still cooing and trying to murmur comforting things to Whirl in an effort to get a response out of him, hopped up onto the berth and sat beside him. He kept pressing one hand onto Whirl’s other clothed thigh as much as he could, and using his other hand too guide Whirl’s helm down to press against his own. He began to stroke the sides in a repetitive motion, humming a little song as he did.

Just back and forth. He could hear the light scraping of metal on metal as his fingers moved. Just back and forth.

After a moment that seemed to stretch on for hours, Whirl began to cry.

It wasn’t huge sobs, no wailing like you see in the movies, no body shaking spasms as he finally stopped holding back his emotions. 

It was like everything else Whirl was right now, quite. A light misting of coolant over his broken and dazed optic, and his biolights gave a single, shutter of irregular pulsing. 

A single muttered, “I’m so tired. I’m so sorry.” 

That was it, if you weren’t focusing you would have missed it. 

And it broke Tailgate’s spark.

Cyclonus squeezed his thigh a little tighter and Tailgate just kept that back and forth motion.

It left like immediately after this Ratchet and First Aid were in the room, gently moving Cyclonus and Tailgate aside, but allowing them to still touch Whirl in some way. Cyclonus moved his hand back up to his shoulder, and Tailgate continued to run his hand back and forth over Whirl’s helm.

Just back and forth, repeating that motion over and over again. Just back and forth.

Whirl wasn’t responding to any of the medics’ questions, and Tailgate didn’t know if it was because he couldn’t answer them, or if he was refusing too.

Tailgate couldn’t hear what they were talking about, his tank was clenching uncomfortable and his audials felt like they were ringing. His processor still felt like it was running at full capacity, focusing on everything but nothing at the same time. Not hearing or understanding what was going on around him, but knowing that the slightest twitch of Whirl’s helm under his fingers meant he was trying not to cry again.

Suddenly they were moving Whirl, taking him away and Tailgate felt a jolt of panic. He needed to help! How can he help!

Cyclonus was pressing him back down onto the berth. “Stay here little one, you’ve done enough. Make yourself some warmed Energon and try to go back to sleep. I will come back when everything is ok.” There was the briefest press of lip on the top of his helm and suddenly the room was empty.

Tailgate sat in the empty room, his processor still going full tilt and the clenching in his tanks feeling worse every second.

What was he supposed to do now?

Silently, he looked around the habsuite, seeing but not recognizing anything. His optics fell onto the dirty, energon stained berth coverings and cloths. 

I guess I’ll clean up, he mused.

So that’s what he did. His mind left like it was shut off as his body worked on autopilot. Collecting the cloths, bundling them up and walking them over to the little washing station tucked into the corner of the room. 

Cybertronians didn’t wear a lot of clothing, unlike organics, so there was never really a need to use the little washing machines the habsuites came with except to clean the occasional berth covering or drying cloth. 

He placed his little bundle in the machine, and hit start. He stood there, arm braced against the machine, shaking, as he watched the objects swirl around for a minute. His hands had energon on them.

He turned back to the berth, there was no energon splatters on it, thankfully, but another quick look around showed that there were some droplets on the floor by the still open door.

Tailgate rummaged around until he found some of his working equipment: a big roll of disposable cleaning cloths, a garbage bag, a hand broom and dust pan, and a strong solvent.

Working his way from his habsuite to Whirl’s like he was following a bread crumb trail like in that human story, he wiped up every energon drop he came across. Rubbing back and forth over each droplet. Erasing the way back home one scrub of solvent at a time.

Whirl’s habsuite door was still open and Tailgate peered inside.

It was a mess. There were clock pieces thrown everywhere, glass covered the floow, dents in the walls from impacts, and in the centre of the room, in a puddle of pink, were a pair of claws.

Tailgate felt numb as he walked into the room, optics fixated on the pink puddle. What should he tackle first?

He went over the the pair of claws first, gingerly picking them up and wiping the energon off of them with the cloths. Then he sprayed it with solvent and wiped away the excess with a clean cloth. Moving back and forth over the cold, grey metal. Once they were clean, he carefully moved them over to the berth, to deal with later.

He turned back to the room. Carefully, he used the cloths to mop up the puddle, trying not to think about how the energon moved in globs, tossing the dirty cloths directly into his garbage bag. Once most of the energon was off the floor, he poured solvent on top. There he scrubbed, just moving back and forth, until even the dried crusted bits were gone.

The garbage bag was stained pink in the inside and there was energon all over his hands.

He ignored it.

He then pulled out his hand broom and got on his hands and knees and started sweeping up all the bits of glass, and machinery. His mind felt blank as he did this, only really feeling that clunch in his tanks and noticing the shaking of his hands as he swept.

In a large glass shard he saw his reflection. His cheeks were flushed with his own energon, and his optics were too bright. There was a beat of stillness as he stared at himself. Then the shard was moved into the garbage bag. Back to sweeping. Moving the broom in a repetitive motion, back and forth back and forth. Then into the bag. 

Suddenly there was no more mess. Tailgate looked around the room and it was spotless, as if nothing had ever happened. That nothing did happen here.

His spark felt like it was spinning tighter in his chest. He looked down at the full garbage bag, then back to the empty room. He sub spaced his useable work equipment and hefted the garbage bag into his arms. 

He left the habsuite. He made sure to shut, but not lock, the door behind him. Nothing happened in there.

He carried the bag until he got to the garbage disposal unit in the wall. He lifted and squeezed the bag down the shoot.

His hands still had dried energon on them.

He turned down to the communal washing racks. They were empty, no one would be using them at this time at night. 

He briefly wondered if anyone woke up during the commotion earlier. He wondered if they went back to sleep.

Tailgate looked down, focusing on how the dried energon looked like it was melting off his hands under the warm solvent spray. He kept them there, extended and not moving until both sides were white again. They dried under the rush of hot air at the dryer, not even a droplet of solvent remaining.

Nothing happened.

Tailgate felt himself moving again, and found he was in front of the energon dispensary in the common room by his habsuite. There was a cube of energon being poured, and light steam was rising off the liquid. When it was done pouring, he touched the glass, not too hot. Grasping it, he moved to sit on the big soft sofa that the bots liked to hog when it was movie night. 

The warmth of the energon seeped into his hands as he rested the cube on his lap. HIs spark was still swirling maddly, and his tanks were still clenched too tight. There was a light gittering sound as his fingers shook against the glass of the cube.

There was no way he was going back to sleep. He felt too jittery, like he needed to do something still.

Glancing around the room, he felt empty, scared, and wide awake. What was he supposed to do now?


End file.
